I feel pleased to see that I’ve beat Wally here, even if he arrives just a few minutes after me, at 6.33 pm, jogging up the ramp, hat bobbing on his head. He’s in such a hurry he almost runs past me.
‘Wally,’ I say, as he’s about to jog through the entrance.
He slows to a stop and smiles tentatively, his gaze close to my face. Then he begins to speak.
‘I’m wearing earplugs,’ I say. ‘So I can’t hear you.’
Wally blinks. Then his mouth moves again.
‘I said I CAN’T HEAR YOU,’ I say louder.
He pushes his glasses up on his nose and then gestures for me to remove an earplug. Reluctantly, I do.
‘I just enquired as to why you are wearing those,’ he says, pointing to my eyes.
‘The swimming goggles? I find they work better than sunglasses to block out the garish lights at these kinds of places.’
The barest of smiles appears at Wally’s lips ‘I . . . see.’
I am aware, of course, that the goggles are a fashion faux pas, but I’d hoped that people might just go with it and assume they were some sort of new trend.
‘Listen,’ Wally says. ‘While your earplug is out, I wanted to say that I’m sorry for being rude the other day. I hadn’t been to this sort of meeting in . . . a while. And you were right, it wasn’t about not being able to find a parking spot. I shouldn’t have got snappy with you.’
You were right. These words remain lodged in my head. You were right. And not just about anything! About something in the muddy confusing world of feelings. I can’t wait to tell Rose.
‘Are you feeling better now?’ I enquire.
He nods. ‘As a matter a fact, I rescheduled my meeting for tomorrow afternoon.’
I give a little clap that feels quite jaunty and I make up my mind to try it again tonight. ‘Fantastic news. And you’ll park at my place?’
‘If you don’t mind.’
‘I don’t mind,’ I say, replacing my earplug. Wally opens his mouth again, but when I point to my earplug, he closes it again and we venture inside.
My senses are assaulted the moment the doors open, even with the goggles and earplugs. The inside of the bowling alley smells like popcorn and hotdogs and fairy floss, a smell that coats my skin and clogs my pores and fills me up from bottom to top, like sand inside my skin. My sneakers stick to the patterned carpet as I walk; the flashing neon lights burn into my retinas. The music blares from all directions – the game machines, the bowling lanes, the overhead speakers – and while the earplugs dull this slightly, it’s still overwhelming. I keep my head down and forge through it, wading further into the wild. Along one wall, about a dozen kids crowd around a long metal table singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to a boy who, according to the numerals on his cake, is eleven years old. Everyone coexists in the space, entirely unperturbed by all of it. Everyone, apparently, except me. On the back wall, I locate a sign that reads BAYSIDE LIBRARY TEAM BUILDING, and usher Wally toward it. Carmel is standing there, wearing a red shirt and a short scarf tied at her throat. Strange as it sounds, she looks rather nice.
‘You’re wearing a scarf,’ I say to Carmel.
She studies me curiously, then says something I can’t hear. I turn away from her, looking instead at a group of youths standing around a vending machine dispensing Pokémon cards. Their appearance suggests they are around ten or eleven. Rose and I had gone bowling when we were a similar age. I was apprehensive about it, but when Rose suggested to Mum we stay home, she just became more determined to take us. ‘It will be great fun,’ she’d said, before she and Rose got into an impassioned argument that only made things worse. Eventually it was clear that we would have to bowl.
When we got there, my strategy was to remain focused on the bowling. I’d read a book about bowling technique and I got three strikes that night. It might have been fun if not for the back and forth between Mum and Rose the whole time. ‘The food is cold.’ ‘My shoes don’t fit.’ ‘It’s not your turn!’ And then, as we waited in line to hand back the shoes: ‘You ruined the evening. This is why we can’t ever go out. What is wrong with you?’
Rose cried all the way home.
I look back at Carmel who is talking animatedly to Wally, frowning and smiling and nodding at intervals. I haven’t seen Carmel smile much before. I notice she has a silver tooth, close to the back. As they talk, Wally rummages through a tub of bowling shoes. He catches my eye and mouths: ‘Foot size?’
‘Seven,’ I reply, and the next thing I know I am sitting on a bench while Wally fits me with bowling shoes. It’s bizarre having someone put your shoes on, as if you’re a child or a mannequin. I tell Wally it’s unnecessary but he keeps doing it, so I let him. It’s actually rather nice.
By 6.45 pm, the whole team has arrived and Carmel gathers the group to deliver some sort of welcome that I can’t hear. Then we are divided into teams and Wally and I are placed with Gayle and Linda, who are delighted by Wally’s presence, judging by the amount of unnecessary touching of his shoulder, forearm and hand.
Wally was correct when he said he was quite good at bowling. In fact, it’s fair to say that he is an exceptional bowler. He gets three strikes in the first three bowls, and I get two. Gayle and Linda don’t hit a pin between them. Carmel, I notice, doesn’t bowl at all, instead using the time to wander up and down among the three teams, much like she does at the library with her cart.
At the end of the round, Wally waves his hands in front of my face. I watch his mouth carefully.
‘May I get you a drink?’ he says slowly.
I am thirsty, I realise. I glance over at the bar area, past a horde of squealing children, to see what they might have available. Behind the bar, which is staffed by a woman in a pink and white-striped boiler suit, I see a sign that says SPRITE.
‘A Sprite would be very nice, thank you, Wally.’
Wally nods and wanders off toward the bar, leaving me to ponder how nice it is, having someone enquire after my thirst like this and then procure me a drink! Wally is, I realise, an above-average date. Linda and Gayle appear to think the same, judging by the way they appear in front of me the moment Wally is out of sight.
‘I can’t hear you,’ I remind them.
They gesture for me to remove my earplugs. I sigh loudly but acquiesce.
‘You’ve been keeping this quiet, haven’t you!’ Linda exclaims.
‘They met in the library,’ Gayle quips.
‘I like his hat,’ Linda says. ‘It reminds me of something.’
‘I know what you mean,’ Gayle says.
I don’t know why they required me to remove my earplugs since they are only speaking among themselves. I glance around for Wally to see how he is doing with our drinks, but he seems to have disappeared.
‘Where’s Wally?’ I ask.
‘Of course!’ Gayle and Linda cry in unison. ‘Where’s Wally? That’s who he looks like.’
Noises ricochet around the room. Someone cheers, and a child cries and a bowling ball hits the polished lane. I wrap my arms around my middle.
‘Finished here, ladies?’ Carmel says.
‘Just taking a break while Rocco gets us some drinks,’ Gayle says.
I see him now, leaning over the bar, making his order. He glances back at me and for an instant, our eyes meet.
‘Remind me again how you met him, Fern,’ Carmel says.
I open my mouth just as a game machine starts playing a tune, and the sound of collective victory and defeat from a couple of small boys rings in my ears.
‘She met him at the library,’ Gayle says. ‘Right, Fern?’
Nearby, the token machine releases a stack of tokens. Clink clink clink clink clink clink clink. I feel people moving closer to me, making space for a person in a wheelchair who is being wheeled past. ‘Um . . . what?’
‘You met Rocco in the library,’ Gayle repeats, louder.
Carmel and Linda keep asking me questions, even as the noise continues around me. It’s like a r
ide I can’t get off. I put my earplugs back in, close my eyes and start to rock gently, then more vigorously.
‘Fern,’ someone says. They must be speaking loudly to get through my earplugs.
I open my eyes again. They’re all looking at me, glancing at each other worriedly, and then looking back at me. Wally is nowhere to be found.
‘What?’ I say, but I must say it too loud or too quiet or in a strange voice, because they all appear rattled.
I rock harder. Disco music plays loudly enough for me to clearly make out the tune even with my earplugs in. Several people dance while they wait for their turn to bowl. My breath is high in my chest and my head is aching.
‘Drinks!’ Wally appears, smiling, carrying a tray of drinks.
I feel like I might scream. Perhaps I do scream, because all of a sudden everyone is gathered around me. It’s unbearable.
‘Move!’ I shout, and they all take a few steps back.
Wally places a hand on my wrist but I rip it away. He nods, then says, ‘Fern. Follow me.’
He waits for a moment to make sure he has my attention, then begins to walk. I follow him, a few paces back, through the gap he has created in the crowd, through the building and out the automatic doors into the cool, soothing air, then away from the entrance and out into the parking lot.
‘Are you all right?’ Wally asks, once we are away from the noise and the smells and the lights.
My heart is still thundering. ‘I thought I could do it,’ I say to Wally, or myself. ‘I thought it would be okay.’
Wally nods. ‘One thing I’ve learned about facing fear,’ he says, ‘is that sometimes, it’s just too scary.’
JOURNAL OF ROSE INGRID CASTLE
Yesterday Owen and I took the Eurostar to Paris. It was late when we checked into our hotel room on the Champs-Élysées and when I woke this morning, Owen was at my bedside with strawberries and proper French coffee. Today we spent the day strolling around the streets, eating and drinking and window shopping. There was a particularly sweet moment while we were climbing the stairs to the Sacré-Cœur in Montmartre. A little girl in a red coat had tripped up the stairs and Owen had scooped her up before she even hit the ground and popped her back on her feet. It had made me smile and ache all at once. That could be our little girl, I thought. If only I could give him a child.
I tried to put it out of my mind, and I did manage to for a while. But then another thought started to distract me. Fern. She hadn’t been answering my calls. She didn’t even answer when we agreed on a scheduled time. It was so unlike her. I know she is probably fine. But . . . what if she isn’t? That’s the tough part. If she were a child, I could call the cops and ask them to go over there and they would. But Fern isn’t a child. For heaven’s sake, I’m the one always advocating for her to be treated equally, as an adult. But in the real world, she’s not like other adults. And she’s my sister. And if I don’t protect her, who will?
My therapist says I’m a perfectionist, in all things, including sisterhood. That is true enough. Ever since I was a child, I’ve longed to be perfect.
If I could just be perfect, I used to think, everything would be okay. It became my life’s mission. Each night I would lie in bed and plan the perfect day, a day incapable of upsetting Mum. I’d get up early, make my own breakfast, clear the dishes quietly. I’d keep an eye out for things I could do to be helpful. Put on a load of laundry, sort the socks, bring Mum a cup of coffee. Mum loved it when I did things like that. She’d smile and say, ‘You’re a good girl, Rose.’
But no matter how hard I tried, I always got something wrong. If I put on the laundry before school, by the time I got home, it had sat there for too long and needed to be rewashed. If I made dinner, I’d accidentally use ingredients Mum had bought for another meal. If I tidied up, I’d always lose something important that Mum had left out intentionally.
It didn’t take long before Mum’s voice permanently took up residence in my mind. It was clear that something was very wrong with me. I was stupid, lazy, selfish. I didn’t pay enough attention to things; I didn’t look after my sister properly. I was bad. Sometimes I was bad even when I hadn’t done anything.
Before I was diagnosed a diabetic, even my health was a source of great irritation to Mum. I knew better than to complain about feeling thirsty or lightheaded, but there were things I couldn’t avoid. For example, occasionally I wet the bed. A classic symptom of juvenile diabetes, I found out later, but at the time we didn’t know that.
‘You wet the bed again, Rose. Again! What is the matter with you?’
I begged Mum to take me to the doctor for months before we finally went. And even after I was diagnosed, Mum still acted like I was making a big deal out of nothing. Every time I tested my blood sugar, she’d roll her eyes. Fern, on the other hand, read up eagerly on diabetes and became an expert, often pointing out what I could and couldn’t eat to Mum. It made Mum wild. There was something about us sticking up for each other that set her off.
Like the time we were ten. Fern and I had just got in from school and we were sitting side by side at the kitchen table with our homework books open. Mum usually napped at this time of day, so we’d both been startled when we heard her pottering around. After a few minutes, she came into the kitchen. Immediately, I knew something bad was coming. Her eyes looked strange. They always looked strange when something bad was coming.
‘All right,’ she said. ‘I know what you’ve done. If you come clean and admit it, you won’t be punished. But if you don’t admit it, there will be consequences for you both.’
Fern looked at me with a puzzled, questioning look in her eyes. I tapped my bracelet against hers and tried to choose my words carefully.
‘What . . . is it, Mum?’
‘Don’t insult my intelligence, young lady! You know exactly what I’m talking about. Look at that face – all innocent. You think I don’t know what a conniving little bitch you are?’
I ran through a list in my head. Had I unknowingly shrunk a piece of her clothing in the dryer? Eaten something she’d earmarked for herself? Been too loud? Too happy? Too miserable? One option was to pick one of those things, but if I was wrong, then I’d be in trouble for two things. I thought until my head hurt. When I couldn’t come up with a response, I couldn’t help it. I cried.
‘Here come the waterworks,’ Mum said, rolling her eyes. ‘It’s not going to work this time, Rose! We’re not leaving this room until one of you admit it.’
I knew Mum meant it. Once, she had locked us outside for hours until we confessed to another crime (stealing her jewellery, that time, which she later found behind her dresser). It was the peak of summer and we didn’t have sunscreen on, so we’d huddled under the one tree in the communal yard, following the shade as it moved. I remember watching some other kids from the building squealing as they ran through the garden sprinkler. We didn’t dare ask to join them, so instead, to pass the time, Fern recounted the plot of the Agatha Christie she’d been reading to me. She was quite good at that, the storytelling. Mum didn’t let us inside until after dark, when the mosquitoes had feasted on us and we’d scratched our ankles so hard we were bleeding.
‘Right,’ Mum had said this day. ‘Well, I’ll just have to pick one of you to be punished. Eenie. Meenie. Miney. Mo.’
She pointed at Fern.
‘It was me,’ I said immediately.
Fern looked surprised, but Mum didn’t. As usual, Mum knew exactly what she was doing. She knew I’d never let Fern get in trouble.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said.
‘Go to your room and don’t come out until I tell you,’ Mum slurred.
After an hour or two, the doorbell rang. Pizza delivery. We’d never had pizza delivered before. It smelled amazing. Mum didn’t call me for dinner, nor did I expect her to, but I was surprised when Fern hadn’t come to bed by 8 pm. I’d been in my room for hours by then, without food and with only half a glass of water that had been sitting beside my bed. I’d been di
agnosed with type 1 diabetes a few months earlier and I knew if I didn’t eat, my blood sugar would become dangerously low. I searched the room for food – the pockets of my clothing, and Fern’s. There was nothing.
Still, Mum didn’t come. I waited. And waited. By midnight, I had a headache. By morning, I was shaky, drenched in sweat and I felt like a sledgehammer was thumping at my temples. The half glass of water was gone. I was freezing, which I knew meant I was hypoglycaemic. I needed sugar. Juice, preferably. I needed to test for ketones. I needed to eat.
Around 9 am when the door flew open, I didn’t even have the energy to lift my head. Mum was standing in the doorway. In her hand was a glass of orange juice. She watched me for a long time. I remember thinking, She’s worried. She’s realised how sick I am. She’ll be horrified by the state of me and she’ll rush to my bedside. She might even drive me to the doctor.
Instead, she calmly sat on the bed. But instead of offering me the juice, she placed it on the bedside table just out of my reach and then held out a wad of cash – tens, twenties, even fifties.
‘You lied,’ she said quietly, holding it out to me. ‘You didn’t take the money. I just found it, in my dresser drawer.’
At first, I was confused. I’d almost forgotten the reason I was in here. So that was it. She thought I’d stolen her money. The idea, of course, was laughable. Of course I didn’t take her money! But she already knew that. She’d merely fabricated it to create some drama.
‘Sometimes I don’t know what is wrong with you, Rose. Why didn’t you just tell me you didn’t do it? You could have saved everyone a lot of trouble.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, or at least tried to, but my throat was too dry to project it.
The Good Sister Page 8